Saturday, December 16, 2017

Saturday Serendipity (December 16, 2017)


Below are just a few recommended reads (and one listen) for this weekend .  .  . 

1.  The Weekly Genealogist of NEHGS provided a link this week to a story that is sure to be of interest to anyone with Irish roots. The Royal College of Surgeons of Ireland (RCSI) has so far identified 10 distinct clusters of DNA differences among people across the island and the clusters roughly mirror ancient provinces. The first genetic map of people living in all the parts of Ireland has been produced. You can learn more by going here.                 

2.  Heard of the "digital dark ages?" You certainly have read genealogy bloggers and researchers who have raised concerns about the preservation and future access to digital data being created in recent years at a truly alarming pace. Most of us hope that all our research efforts and written summaries of that research will survive for our descendants, but will it? This quote from Vincent G. Cerf, VP at Google, should cause all genealogists -- professional or amateur -- to cringe, "All digital artifacts that we have created today in the beginnings of the 21st century will no longer be accessible in the 22nd century."  Yesterday on many NPR stations the Science Friday (SciFri) show of Ira Flatow, presented a piece titled "Preventing A 'Digital Dark Age.'"  You can listen to the 12-minute piece here.  It is part of the series "File Not Found" by Lauren Young.  You can also access three-parts of the series on the very serious problem of storing, preserving, and making accessible in the future all the digital data we are producing. Every genealogist should be aware of the issues and what is being done. Here are the links to the three parts: (1) "Ghosts In The Reels"; (2) "The Librarians Saving The Internet"; and (3) "Data Reawakening."

3.  This week Marian Wood of Climbing My Family Tree blog treats us to a look into her project of testing whether her husband's memory of his family's experience of a famous historic event was correct. It is an instructive piece of detective work. You can read it here.    
        
4.  Finally, Nancy Messier of My Ancestors & Me blog has confessed she has too many ancestors. Read her delightful 'Confession" here.               
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Copyright 2017, John D. Tew
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3 comments:

  1. Marian B. WoodDecember 17, 2017 at 9:59 AM

    John, thanks for including me in this week's picks. And thanks especially for the quote from the Google exec. I couldn't agree more. That's why I print everything and file away in surname or family files or boxes. It's the most reliable way to keep facts and photos safe for the future of my family.

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    1. JohnDecember 17, 2017 at 2:24 PM

      My pleasure Marian. It was a beautiful little piece of detective work and nicely presented.

      I too am very concerned about preserving all the hard work I have done for my children and descendants. Paper has proven its staying power over a few millennia now, digital media are very new in historical terms and already we see what can be done by the errant push of a button or nefarious acts of hacking, let alone the more concealed problems caused by mere changes in technology and format platforms, etc. Like archivists, serious genelogists need to be VERY concerned about preservation issues -- and my money is still on good old paper. ;-)

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  2. NancyDecember 17, 2017 at 2:46 PM

    Thank you for mentioning my post, John. I appreciate it. Thanks, too, for highlighting the other articles, too. Digital is such a new medium it seems to me that we don't really have any idea how long things will last. On the other hand, paper and books have been around for ages, though their longevity is not sure proof (or fire- or flood proof), by any means. I've never printed my blog posts but my brother, good older brother that he is, prints every post.

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